


uncharted territory

by thespacenico



Series: klancemas 2018 [15]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M, Spoiler alert: He's not, adam and keith have a nice talk, hand holding, i love adam so much what is this, keith and lance are so smitten, keith may or may not have another sort of realization, merry christmas eve, sleepover in the observatory, some cute adashi stuff, they're so nervous around each other the poor boys, you thought keith was done panicking? lol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-26 18:32:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17146901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thespacenico/pseuds/thespacenico
Summary: klancemas day fifteen: traditions





	uncharted territory

**Author's Note:**

> everyone: finally! they have no reason to be oblivious idiots anymore  
> me: muahaha 
> 
> (maybe not oblivious, but they're both still so nervous leave them be)  
> (i didn't look through this for typos because it's christmas eve and i'm hanging with my fam so don't judge me too hard)  
> (merry christmas eve and happy holidays! i love you guys, thank you so much for reading this series so far 💕)

**Keith K > lancey lance  
**December 15th, 1:14 AM

 **Keith K:** ~~hey i think i should tell you~~

~~lance i really like you~~

~~i can’t stop thinking about holding your hand~~

~~i like you a lot and i think you like me so~~

~~in case it’s not super obvious already i really really like you~~

 

Keith erases what’s probably the billionth text in the past thirty minutes, drops his handheld onto the sheets beside him, and smushes a pillow over his face.

“I’ve been inside a weblum’s digestive tract,” he mutters. “I’ve piloted two different robot Lions across the galaxy, I’m a member of an alien rebel group of resistance fighters, I lived for two years on a space whale in the Quantum Abyss, so _why—”_ he lets his arms fall out on either side of him and groans into the pillow. “—can’t I send _one text?”_

He tosses the pillow away and rolls over onto his stomach, glaring at his handheld. It’s hardly been two hours since he and Lance said goodnight to one another, and it’s so— _pitiful,_ but all Keith can think about is the warmth of Lance’s hand in his and the circles he’d been tracing onto the back of his and all he knows is that he wants to hold it again. A lot. Maybe forever.

Keith feels his face flush at the thought and groans again, balling his hands into fists and pressing them to his cheeks because they haven’t been a normal freaking temperature all night. “Stupid,” he mutters. “I’m so—this is so— _stupid.”_

But he has to tell Lance now. He _has_ to, there’s no reason that he can’t, no reason that he shouldn’t, especially not when Lance has made it clear that maybe he—feels the same way?

 _Obviously he does,_ his brain sighs. _He held your hand, what more do you need?_

Keith rolls over again and stares at the ceiling. Rolls back and stares at his door.

 _He’s probably asleep anyway,_ he thinks.

He glares at his handheld some more. Taps the screen and checks the time. Three minutes have passed. He makes a frustrated noise and drops his face into his hands. Lifts it because he really needs to sneeze. He sneezes. “I hate this,” he mumbles, shivering a little in the sweatshirt he borrowed (stole) from Shiro’s room that’s very clearly too big for him. He’s definitely getting a cold.

A few more minutes are spent having a staring contest with his handheld while the two halves of his brain argue with one another.

_You should text him._

_It’s one in the morning. You know, when normal people are asleep._

_But he’s always up super late, he could still be awake._

_Okay? But it’s still one in the morning. Texting him now would be weird, you should’ve done that hours ago._

_He held your hand._ You _held his hand._

“Stupid,” Keith mutters again, even as he’s reaching for his handheld. He rolls back over and pushes himself up into a sitting position, hunching over the screen as he reopens their messages. He taps the message bar and watches the blinking cursor.

 

 **Keith K:** ~~hey i know it’s late, but~~

~~hey. sorry i didn’t text earlier, i’m just super nervous~~

~~hi lance. listen, i really have to tell you~~

 

“Stop freaking out,” Keith scowls at himself as he erases the last message.

 _Keep it simple,_ his brain adds.

He thinks for a minute.

 

 **Keith K:** hey, lance? i really, really like you.

 

His heart is racing as his thumb hovers over the send button. He bites his lip. Sneezes into Shiro’s sweater sleeve. Sniffs as he looks back at the screen.

 _Just send it,_ his brain says encouragingly. _What’s the worst that could happen?_

 _Total rejection, maybe?_ he thinks nervously.

_Send. The. Message._

So he takes a deep breath—and turns off his handheld. “No,” he says out loud, tossing it away. “Not through a text. I’m not telling him I like him through a text, that’s so— _l_ _ame.”_

The mattress bounces a little underneath him as he flops back down and crawls under the covers. He pulls the sheets up to his chin, rolls onto his side with a sigh, and stares at the door. It stares back at him. He picks a little at the sheets.

 _I wonder if he’s awake,_ he thinks.

He chews on his lip for a minute, and then he rolls over onto his other side.

_In the morning. In the morning, I’ll tell him. That’s the first thing I’m gonna do._

He closes his eyes.

That lasts about thirty seconds.

He opens his eyes. “I’m an idiot,” he says, and then he tears the covers off and slips out of bed and makes it all the way to the door before he stops with his hand on the doorknob.

 _C’mon, just open the door,_ his brain says without any attempt to mask the desperation he feels. _You have to tell him._

_But what if he’s asleep?_

_But what if he’s not!_

Keith makes a sort of choked noise as he glares down at his fingers wrapped around the doorknob. His heart does a backflip. “I’m such an idiot,” he says again, and then he takes another deep breath and opens the door—right at the same that Lance opens his door across the hallway.

They blink at each other in the dark for a moment. Keith feels his heart seize up in his chest just at the sight of Lance, which is ridiculous because he can hardly make him out right now but he can’t help it. He blinks again as his eyes adjust to the darkness of the hallway; then Lance throws a hand over his mouth to stifle a laugh and Keith feels heat bloom across his cheeks as he realizes—with a content, satisfied, giddy sort of feeling—that Lance is wearing his hoodie. Because even though he’d been wearing it earlier, this is so much different because it’s not like Keith forced him to wear it this time which must mean that Lance—wanted to wear it, and Keith feels _warm._ Maybe caught totally off guard and almost completely off-balance, but warm all the same.

Lance bites his lip and waves timidly and Keith wouldn’t have been able to keep himself from smiling if his life depended on it. He just points wordlessly at the ceiling, and Lance seems to understand what he means because his smile grows and he nods, and then before Keith knows it they’re climbing the stairs to the third floor together.

Keith’s heart is thumping in his chest as they sneak down the hallway, because it suddenly feels very much like just that—sneaking. Lance is much quieter than he was the first time they did this, but every time Keith chances a look at him he’s got this big smile on his face that makes Keith’s breath catch in his throat. Because his hair is ruffled and his eyes are bright and something—something tugs at his heart in very much the same way it did when he looked at him in the soft glow of Christmas lights in the living room, only in a different way at the same time.

He doesn’t really have time to dwell on it before they reach the middle of the hallway, and Lance keeps glancing over his shoulder as Keith reaches up to pull the hatch to the observatory open. Keith carefully lowers the ladder to the floor and stops on the first rung. “Hey.” Lance turns back to look at him, and Keith shoots him a small smile. “Adam and Shiro are the only ones who know about this place other than us.”

A look of relief seems to flicker across Lance’s face as he smiles back and nods, and then Keith starts to climb the ladder. He clambers to the top as Lance follows behind and turns, holding out his hand again to help him out. But this time, in a rare moment of boldness, when Lance takes his hand and Keith pulls him up onto the floor—

He doesn’t let go.

For a second they stand very still and look at each other, Keith’s heart fluttering so nervously in his chest he swears it’s beating as fast as a hummingbird’s wings right now.

And then Lance slowly twists their fingers together and bites his lip as he smiles again.

“Hi.”

“Hey,” Keith breathes.

Lance looks so good in Keith’s hoodie, how is this _fair._ “You couldn’t sleep either, huh?”

Keith shakes his head, peering down at their hands, and his breath almost catches again because he can’t believe this is real. “Not really,” he manages. He hesitates. “At all,” he adds.

There’s a bit of an awkward pause, and then Lance lets out a small huff and rubs the back of his neck. “Sorry, I—don’t really know what to do from here. Um—”  

“Do you want to open the dome?” Keith offers, and _god_ he’ll never get used to the way Lance keeps smiling at him like that.

Lance just nods, so Keith (reluctantly) slips his hand out of his and goes to slide open the wooden cover while Lance settles into the leftover blankets and pillows from the last time they were up here. Half of the sky is obscured by the clouds coming in (it’s probably going to snow tomorrow), but there’s still plenty of starlight that filters through the glass and scatters across the floor. Keith goes to sit beside Lance, and as soon as he does, Lance is reaching for his hand again and pressing close, their knees knocking gently as he folds his legs.

“Okay?” he whispers, squeezing Keith’s hand.

“Yeah,” Keith whispers back, unable to hold back his smile.

They sit quietly for a moment, arms pressed against each other, legs folded criss-cross and hands resting where their knees are brushing. Keith doesn’t think it’s healthy for his heart to be beating this fast for so long, but at this point he really doesn’t care.

There’s been some kind of shift—some kind of shift in the way in the way they see each other, the way they talk to each other, like they’re both exploring some kind of uncharted territory but they’re worried that they’ll get lost somehow—because maybe there’s some kind of unspoken thing between them that neither of them have the courage to say out loud yet.

Lance sniffles a little after a minute, and Keith peeks over at him.

“Are you doing okay?”

“Yeah,” Lance pokes at his foot. “I’m okay. I was wearing, like, four pairs of socks before I came out of my room, and I keep sniffing, but other than that I’m okay.”

“I’ve been sneezing into Shiro’s sweater all night,” Keith agrees, and Lance giggles. “And I keep shivering no matter how many blankets I put over my bed.”

Lance glances down. “I guess we shouldn’t be holding hands like this if we’re both getting sick.”

The corners of Keith’s mouth twitch up. “Maybe not.”

Neither of them let go. Keith thinks his heart is going to explode if it beats any faster.

“So, um—” Lance shifts the tiniest bit. “I know I keep asking, but this is okay, right? I mean—it isn’t too much? Like—”

“It’s fine,” Keith says immediately, maybe a bit too rushed because Lance looks up at him with his brow creased. “Good. It’s—” He takes a breath to reset. “Sorry. Really, it’s okay. I promise.”

Lance smiles a little at that and tucks his fingers a little tighter around Keith’s. “As long as you’re sure.”

 _I’ve never been more sure about anything in my life,_ Keith thinks, and then tries not to cringe at himself because when in the world did he get to be this way?

They sit up there for a long time, watching the clouds roll slowly across the sky until the stars are almost completely gone. Lance laughs a little every time Keith sneezes, which is fine with him if it means Lance keeps smiling. Eventually they end up moving the pillows and blankets around so they can lie down, which warrants that they let go of each other, but every time that they do they end up finding each other’s hands again.

“Your hoodie is comfy,” Lance says at some point, when they’re both turned over on their sides with their elbows propped underneath their heads to look at each other.

“It looks good on you,” Keith answers, and Lance shoots him a crooked grin.

“Better than it does on you?”

“Yes.”

Even in the dark, Keith can see Lance’s smile falter a little, like he wasn’t quite expecting that response, and then his cheeks go red before he ducks his head. “I’m glad you don’t wear those dumb fingerless gloves anymore.”

Keith huffs, and Lance giggles a little. “They weren’t dumb.”

“Well—” Lance’s eyes fall to where their hands lie on the blankets in between them. He chews on his lip for a minute, and then: “If you were still wearing them, I wouldn’t really know what it feels like to hold your hand,” he says quietly, and it takes literally all of Keith’s effort not to just _die_ on the spot. Then Lance looks back up at him with a shy sort of smile, and Keith finds himself holding his breath.

 _This is the part where you tell him,_ his brain says.

But something—stops him.

 _Not yet,_ another part of him whispers, because— _there’s so much more to this. There’s so much more to him. He is more, he is everything—_

He doesn’t remember telling it to, but he feels his hand slip out of Lance’s, and sees Lance’s expression morphing into confusion until Keith is slowly reaching out; he hears Lance’s breath hitch in his throat when his hand touches his cheek, and his thumb brushes carefully over his cheekbone, and then he can feel Lance’s skin heating up underneath his palm where he rests it at his jaw.

“I’ve always wanted to do that,” Keith breathes.

Lance swallows. “Really?”

Keith’s heart aches, suddenly. “Really.”

Lance closes his eyes and makes a sort of whimpering noise. “Oh my god.”

“Sorry,” Keith whispers. “Too much.”

“No—” Lance shakes his head, and then reaches up to place his hand over Keith’s. “No, it’s—god, Keith, it’s okay.”

And they lie there like that for a while, and Keith lets himself stare, and stare until Lance finally opens his eyes, and he smiles, and Keith’s heart _aches,_ because—

 _Oh my god,_ Keith thinks. _Oh my god,_ he thinks again, a little panicked, and then Lance is sliding their hands back together and Keith wonders if it’s possible for it to be impossible to ever stop falling.

He doesn’t think they mean to fall asleep in the observatory. When he wakes up, there’s muted sunlight leaking into the room despite the cloud cover outside, and for a moment he lets himself lie there and enjoy it as he blinks the sleep out of his eyes. His back aches in a weird spot from sleeping on the floor and his nose is kind of stuffy, but other than that, he’s comfortable.

Lance is still asleep, curled up in one of the blankets with a hand under his head, snoring softly. Keith vaguely remembers laughing a little last night at how Lance kept trying to insist that he wasn’t tired, despite the fact that his eyelids kept drooping and he kept nodding off. He thought it was all very cute, but that’s not news to anyone.

But then he remembers the way he felt last night, when Lance’s voice went all soft and his smile all shy and Keith came to yet another realization—

The panic overwhelms everything else. Keith slowly sits up and carefully extracts himself from the pile so as not to wake Lance, and then he leaps halfway down the ladder and makes for the stairs.

Adam is making coffee when he tumbles into the kitchen, a little out of breath. “Oh, Keith! There you are. How are you feeling—”

“I need to talk to you,” Keith blurts.

He must look as frantic as he feels, because Adam _leaves his coffee_ and leads them both up the stairs and into Keith’s room. Keith sinks onto his bed and pulls his knees up as Adam pushes the door shut. He opens his mouth to say something as he’s coming to sit beside Keith, and then pauses. “Is that Takashi’s sweatshirt?”

Keith hunches his shoulders a little. “I let Lance borrow my hoodie,” he mumbles.

“Oh.” Adam slowly sits down. “That’s, um, very nice of you.” Keith makes a sort of choked noise, and Adam huffs a laugh. “Just tell me what happened, Keith.”

Keith hunches a little more into the sweater. “You can’t tell anyone.”

Adam adjusts his glasses a little. “Tell anyone what?”

“Well—” Keith pulls the sleeves over his hands and starts to play with them nervously. “Last night, Lance—when we were on the couch—” He clears his throat and Adam sighs.

“Keith, I can’t help you if you can’t tell me what’s going on—”

“He held my hand,” Keith blurts again, and Adam’s eyebrows shoot up and Keith feels his face flush. “I mean, I held _his_ hand—we held hands. On the couch, under the blankets—” Keith buries his face in his arms, completely mortified. “Oh my god.”

The blush creeps all the way down his neck before Adam reaches over and carefully pats his back. “Isn’t this—you know. A good thing?”

Keith lifts his head, keeping his eyes on the floor. “Yeah, it _was,”_ he starts, and Adam’s brow furrows in confusion. “But then we went up to the observatory last night, and—I was finally gonna tell him and I nearly did but then I—couldn’t.”

There’s a moment of quiet as Adam seems to process, and then he lets out a breath. “Keith, I don’t understand. Lance holding your hand effectively invalidates every single reason there was for you to be scared of telling him. I get that you’re pretty dense when it comes to Lance—” Keith’s head snaps up and he opens his mouth to argue, but Adam just goes on before he can get a word in. “—but even you couldn’t possibly miss the fact that he likes you back by now. So what’s the problem?”

“Adam—” Keith shakes his head in frustration. “The _problem_ is that I’ve already tried to tell him at least three times by now that I liked him and I’ve never been able to—”

“Okay, slow down,” Adam holds a hand up. “Liked?”

Keith pales. “Well—I mean—” he stammers. “That’s—what I’m saying. I think I haven’t been able to tell him because I—don’t like him.”

Adam gives him the most deadpan look that Keith has ever seen in probably his entire life. “If that’s what you think, then you’re in worse denial than I thought—”

“No!” Keith interrupts him, feeling suddenly very out of breath. “I’m not—what I mean is that I think I—um—” He bites his lip, and then Adam’s eyes widen a tiny bit as he seems to come to a slow realization of what Keith is saying, and Keith kind of wishes that Shiro’s sweatshirt would swallow him whole.

“Oh.” Adam turns a little more to better face Keith. “I see.”

Keith lets the sleeves slide back down his arms and covers his face in his hands with a groan. “I sound so stupid.”

Adam laughs at that. “You don’t sound stupid, Keith.” He pokes Keith in the shoulder when he doesn’t come back up. “Hey. Are you going to talk to me or not?”

Keith lifts his head and sighs, hugging his knees to his chest. “You can’t make fun of me.”

“I wasn’t going to.”

“It’s just that—” Keith bites his lip uncertainly, wiggling his toes. Adam pokes him again, and he huffs. “I don’t want to tell him I like him because it doesn’t feel like—enough. It doesn’t even begin to cover everything. Plus—” He pauses, and Adam waits patiently for him to continue. “It all feels like it’s happening too fast, maybe? I only realized that I even liked him barely a week ago and now—” He makes a frustrated noise and falls back onto the bed. “That’s not possible, right? I’m just—confused, or something.”

There’s another short moment of quiet, and then Adam leans back on his elbow to level with Keith. “Honestly, I don’t think you are.”

“How would you know,” Keith mumbles, but there’s no bite behind it.

Adam lays his other hand on his stomach and taps his fingers. “You haven’t been back on Earth that long,” he says gently. “You were fighting a war out there, Keith. I don’t think you really had time to think about your feelings during all that. It just took a while for them to—catch up to you.”

Keith huffs a laugh, but it’s a little too bitter for his taste. “I lead a group of giant flying robot Lions against an alien empire in an intergalactic space war. You’d think this would be easy.”

Adam smiles a little sadly. “You’re just a kid.”

Keith stares at the ceiling for a moment, and then he closes his eyes and sighs. “I guess I’m just—scared.”

It’s quiet again, then: “Love is a scary thing sometimes,” Adam says softly.

Something twists in Keith’s chest. “I don’t know what to do.”

Adam taps his fingers some more, and then Keith opens his eyes when he shifts beside him. “Can I show you something?”

Keith turns his head and watches as Adam fishes around for something in his pocket, and then immediately shoots up when he sees the familiar blue velvet box. “What, you carry that around in your pocket now?”

“I don’t want Takashi to find it,” Adam says in defense. “Just—look.” Keith leans forward as he flips open the box, and Keith’s reaction to the simple silver wedding band is similar to the one he had when Adam first showed him the box in the first place.

His mouth drops open. “You—still have that?”

“Of course I do,” Adam smiles.

“But—” Keith flounders for words. “But that’s—”

“The ring Takashi used to propose to me before he left,” Adam finishes. “Yeah.”

“Oh my god, Shiro’s never going to stop crying,” Keith breathes, and Adam laughs.

“Exactly. And I don’t even have to say anything.”

Keith looks up and narrows his eyes at him. “Where are you going with this?”

He makes a noise of protest as Adam closes the box and slips it back into his pocket. “Do you know how I confessed in the first place?”

 _“Ugh.”_ Keith rolls his eyes drops his head back. “Do I want to?”

“I wrote him a letter.”

Keith looks back at him. Adam raises an eyebrow. Keith squints. “And Shiro _still_ said ‘thank you’?”

Adam snorts. “Cut him some slack. He panicked.” Keith wrinkles his nose, unconvinced, and then ducks away when Adam tries to ruffle his hair. _“Anyway,_ now I write him a letter every year. It’s kind of like a tradition.”

“I still don’t know where you’re going with this,” Keith says, sitting back.

“My point is, we’re kind of the same that way.”

Keith frowns. “I don’t write letters.”

“Not the letters, Keith,” Adam sighs. “I mean we’re both decidedly terrible at talking about how we feel. We’re better at showing it.”

Keith looks down and picks at the sheets. “I guess,” he mumbles.

Adam watches him for a minute. “So I guess what I’m trying to tell you is that maybe you don’t have to tell him. Not until you’re ready. Just—show him, for now.” Keith keeps picking at the sheets, and then Adam takes a breath and goes to stand. “Alright, I’m going to go remake my coffee, considering it’s definitely cold by now.”

“Just stick it in the microwave,” Keith says, and Adam makes a pained noise.

“Have you learned nothing from the time you’ve lived with me.” He shakes his head as Keith shrugs. “Do you need anything?” Keith sneezes in response. “I’ll make you some tea,” Adam nods, and then opens the door to leave.

“Wait, Adam—” He pauses in the doorway when Keith calls him back, and he shifts a little awkwardly from his place on the bed. “Can we—keep all this between us? Lance and I haven’t exactly talked about last night, so—I just don’t want anyone to talk about it—”

“Talk about what?” Adam asks, and Keith lets out a sort of exasperated breath and smiles in relief as Adam winks and shuts the door behind him.

Keith sits there on his bed for another few minutes, pulling the sleeves back over his hands and taking a deep breath. “Just show him,” he murmurs to himself. “Okay. Maybe—I can do that.”

He glances at his handheld still lying at the edge of his bed from last night and wonders if Lance is awake yet. Maybe not, but he reaches for it anyway.

 

 **Keith K > lancey lance  
**December 15th, 9:21 AM

 **Keith K:** hi  
are you awake?

 **lancey lance:** hi :)  
in case u could not tell from that message, i am indeed awake

 **Keith K:** adam is making tea because he heard me sneeze approximately one time  
do you want some?

 **lancey lance:** sure :)

 **Keith K:** okay i’ll tell him  
:)

 **lancey lance:** asdkfjkl  
sorry i’m still not used to that  
it makes my heart all squishy

 

“I don’t know what that means,” Keith mutters, even as he’s smiling at the screen like a lovestruck idiot.

 

 **Keith K:** i don’t think that’s healthy

 **lancey lance:** thanks for the input  
i’ll see u downstairs?

 **Keith K:** yeah

 **lancey lance:** okay :)

**Author's Note:**

> come say hi on [tumblr](https://www.taxashi.tumblr.com)!  
> 


End file.
